How Malaysia’s education system went to the dogs since 1974
The Malay nationalists such as Mahathir Mohamad, Musa Hitam, Sulaiman Daud, Abdullah Badawi, Anwar Ibrahim, Hishammuddin Hussein, Mustapha Mohamed, Khaled Nordin, Muhyiddin Yassin, Idris Jusoh, Mahdzir Khalid (and now Maszlee Malik) used education as their political platform (just like what DAP and MCA are doing with the Chinese schools and Chinese education issue — using them as political platforms). And that was why Malaysia’s education system went to the dogs.
NO HOLDS BARRED
Raja Petra Kamarudin
The Pakatan Harapan government loves blaming the previous Prime Minister for all the country’s woes.
If Jho Low had not stolen RM50 billion of 1MDB’s money then we need not ask borrowers who owe RM40 billion in PTPTN loans to repay their loans.
When we prepared the Budget 2019 we did not realise that Malaysia’s debts are that high.
In 2015, 2016, 2017, and just before GE14 in 2018, when we said Malaysia will go bankrupt if Malaysians do not change the government we did not realise that what we said was actually true.
When we said we will abolish the GST if Pakatan Harapan comes to power we did not realise that we can actually come to power and hence we will have to deliver our promise and therefore the country will not have enough money to pay the RM100 billion a year civil service salary.
Those are just some of the many excuses the Pakatan Harapan government offers, basically blaming the previous prime minister for all the country’s current problems.
Coming out with excuses is exhausting
Actually, in a way that is true. Cancer does not happen overnight and the cancer afflicting Malaysia took decades or generations to reach what can be regarded as this incurable stage.
Even worse than the financial or economic situation is Malaysia’s education system. Ask any Chinese and he or she will tell you that the main concern of the Chinese community is regarding Malaysia’s sub-standard education system. And this is one of the reasons (got other reasons also) Chinese will defend their Chinese schools and Chinese-language education to the death (figure of speech, of course).
Anyway, that is not the issue. The issue is this problem was not always there. In the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, Malaysia’s education system was at par with other advanced countries. In fact, because Malaysia’s education system was established by the British, we were more advanced than many other neighbouring countries, save maybe for Singapore.
So, what happened? How come over the last 40-50 years or so Malaysia’s superior education system got reduced to a third-world standard? In fact, former prime minister Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi hit the nail on the head when he said Malaysia is a country with first-world infrastructure but third-world mentality.
In 1955, Tun Razak Hussein became the education minister.
In 1957, when Tunku Abdul Rahman became prime minister, his education ministers were Khir Johari, Rahman Talib, Hamid Khan, and Rahman Ya’kub.
It was when Mahathir became education minister in 1974 followed by Musa Hitam in 1978 that Malaysia’s education system began to decline
In 1970, Tun Razak took over as prime minister and his education ministers were Hussein Onn, Mohamed Yaacob and Mahathir Mohamad.
Tun Hussein Onn then took over as prime minister in 1978 and his education minister was Tun Musa Hitam. It is said that was when things began to change. Musa is a Malay nationalist (some say socialist) — just like Mahathir before him — and he wanted to erase the British colonial education system and replace it with a ‘Malay’ system.
Mahathir took over as prime minister in 1981 and he appointed Sulaiman Daud, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, and then Anwar Ibrahim as his education ministers.
Until today the Chinese educationists are still angry with Mahathir and Anwar for what they did to the education system
In 1995, Najib Razak took over as education minister but, by then, the rot had gone down to the roots and Malaysia’s education system was beyond repair. Twenty years of bad policies had literally destroyed what took the British 100 years to develop from the late-1800s. The 1900 policy to turn Malaya’s education system to become par with England’s education system went out the window from the mid-1970s.
Even worse is that Najib was education minister for just four years and after him came Hishammuddin Hussein, Mustapha Mohamed, Khaled Nordin, Muhyiddin Yassin, Idris Jusoh, Mahdzir Khalid, and now Maszlee Malik. With all these people as education ministers what can you expect? You cannot have idiots as education ministers and expect the students to become geniuses.
So, there you have it. And this is one failure you cannot pin on Najib. The Malay nationalists such as Mahathir Mohamad, Musa Hitam, Sulaiman Daud, Abdullah Badawi, Anwar Ibrahim, Hishammuddin Hussein, Mustapha Mohamed, Khaled Nordin, Muhyiddin Yassin, Idris Jusoh, Mahdzir Khalid (and now Maszlee Malik) used education as their political platform (just like what DAP and MCA are doing with the Chinese schools and Chinese education issue — using them as political platforms). And that was why Malaysia’s education system went to the dogs.
